My trip to Rukiga - by Head Girl, Sophie Murray

I have had a growing interest  for the work of charities in the developing world and have an aspiration of becoming a humanitarian for an NGO in the future.

Last year I joined the committee of a local Ickenham based charity called CLICKRukiga which stands for ‘Community Link ICKenham Rukiga’ and focuses not only on how the Ickenham community can help and support this underdeveloped part of Uganda  but also how we can learn from them.

I was given the opportunity in November 2018, to go and visit the village we have been fundraising for. I met the children sponsored by Ickenham families and joined in with the ‘Kamweizie High school’ helping them and sharing my knowledge of English and I.T.

The children I worked with were elated to see us and their faith is undeniably the most important thing to them. A school of 600 pupils shared just 5 classrooms and 8 computers. My daily diet consisted of pineapple for breakfast, matoke (mashed banana plantain) with rice for lunch and dinner.

Needless to say, this was an amazing experience with so much to take in. It has made a huge impact on me. The day after I returned to the UK, getting on the bus to come to school on the Monday was hard. Getting up early for it was a factor of course, but it was mainly because I thought back to the poor conditions of the school and homes I had left behind. The happy outlook of those I met and their positive attitude towards everything, is certainly a contrast to having a grumpy bus driver and people complaining because it’s a Monday morning and they had to go to work and school!

The Ugandan people in this region are stuck in a cycle of poverty. Without education they cannot get a job, with no job they struggle to find the basic needs. They cannot look after their family, and are unable to give their children the education that they would want them to have.

We are now fundraising again to enable them to have windows installed in their classrooms and eventually give them another classroom block with a library.

I strongly believe that we have the power to change things for people who have so much less than we do. Even small changes can make such a huge difference.